Tanya Heikkila
Kimberley Roussin Isett
Columbia University
Essays on
Citizen
Participation
and Governance
Tanya Heikkila is an assistant professor
of public affairs at Columbia University’s
School of International and Public Affairs.
Her research interests are comparative
institutional analysis and performance, with
a focus on natural resource management
institutions. She holds a PhD in
management from the University of
Arizona’s School of Public Administration
and Policy.
E-mail: th2063@columbia.edu.
Kimberley Roussin Isett is an
assistant professor of management at
Columbia University’s Mailman School of
Public Health. She received her PhD in
management with a specialization in
organization theory from the University of
Arizona. Her research focuses on institutional pressures and dynamics in
implementing government services,
with a particular interest in coordination
and collaboration among agencies.
E-mail: ki2129@columbia.edu.
Citizen Involvement and Performance Management
in Special-Purpose Governments
Performance management and citizen participation are
being used by local governments to improve government
accountability and responsiveness. In some cases, local
governments are integrating these two trends. One area
of local government in which this trend has not been
assessed is special districts. This paper uses data from a
study of nine special districts in the state of Texas to fill
this void. To assess citizen participation in performance
management among the districts, we interviewed district
managers, analyzed minutes from governing board
meetings, and conducted citizen focus groups in three
regions of the state. Our findings suggest that although
districts may not yet be in tune with the latest performance management trends, they are making efforts to
engage citizens in other ways. We recommend ways that
districts can build on these experiences and more
effectively incorporate citizens in the development,
analysis, and reporting of performance measures.
O
of their opportunities for direct connections to citizens
in management processes.
This paper presents data on another level of local
government—special districts—and explores the
extent to which the movement toward citizen involvement in performance management has spread outside
traditional government structures. Special districts,
which for the purposes of this paper include both
districts and authorities, are government units that
provide a limited number of specialized services such
as transportation, fire protection, water management,
health care, or housing.1 Given that much of the
literature on special districts has criticized this form of
government as being less accountable and less transparent than general-purpose governments, we expect
that the knowledge of performance management tools
and receptiveness to citizen involvement within
districts to be limited.
ver the past decade, public management
scholars and practitioners have expressed
To explore our hypothesis, we conducted a pilot study
growing interest in the use of both
to assess citizen involvement and performance manperformance management tools and citizen participaagement in special districts in three metropolitan areas
in the state of Texas: Houston/
tion to increase government acHarris County, San Antonio/
countability and effectiveness.
Over the past decade, public
Bexar County, and Austin/
Recently, we have seen a movemanagement scholars and prac- Travis County. The pilot study
ment to integrate these two trends,
titioners have expressed growing involved interviews with disencouraging governments to rely
trict managers, analyses of
more on citizen input in the develinterest in the use of both
opment of performance indicators
performance management tools governing board minutes, and
and the monitoring of perforfocus groups with citizen activand citizen participation to
mance. The Alfred P. Sloan Founists in the three regions. This
increase government accountdation, for example, has funded a
paper presents our findings,
ability and effectiveness.
number of initiatives to encourage
which suggest that although
districts engage citizens to
municipal governments to involve
varying degrees in decision making, they typically do
citizens in developing and implementing performance
not use citizen input to determine performance stanmanagement systems. Examples of these initiatives
dards or monitor performance. Drawing on ideas
include Iowa’s Citizen-Initiated Performance Assesselicited in our focus groups and from professional
ment project, the Fund for the City of New York’s
practice guidelines, this paper concludes by offering
citizen-based assessments of the effectiveness of city
government services, and Rutgers University’s National recommendations on how districts can more effecCenter for Public Productivity. These projects focus on tively link citizen interests to performance
municipal governments as a key starting point because management.
238
Public Administration Review • March | April 2007
Background: Accountability through Citizen
Participation and Performance Management
Many policy scholars and political theorists have
argued that direct citizen participation in government,
particularly through public deliberation, is fundamental to establishing a responsive and accountable
democracy (Box 1998; Ostrom 1997; Pateman 1970;
Tocqueville 1835–40).2 Forums such as town hall
meetings and citizen referenda have long been used to
allow citizens to participate directly in policy making
in the United States. However, the opportunities for
citizens to participate in administrative or policy
implementation decisions have been less visible until
the second half of the 20th century (Roberts 2004).
Over the past 30 years, increasing demands from
citizens to participate in administrative decisions and
the passage of policies that mandate direct citizen
participation have led to greater participation by
citizens in decision making within a wide range of
public service domains (Roberts 2004; Thomas 1995).
In studying the growth of public participation efforts,
scholars have begun to identify the benefits of direct
citizen involvement, such as greater citizen support
for government decisions (Kweit and Kweit 2004),
increased social capital in communities (Leach, Pelkey,
and Sabatier 2002; Putnam 1993), and increased
capacity to resolve “wicked” problems (Roberts 2002).
The rise in public participation is certainly not
always beneficial, as these efforts can be costly, timeconsuming, and ineffectual in reaching consensus on
solutions to problems (Thomas 1995).
public issues, particularly when agencies desire perspectives that are representative of a large community.
More informal methods of public participation are
also commonly used to engage citizens. Some
informal methods include calling up key contacts or
community leaders to assess community needs and
opinions or sending agency representatives to attend
meetings of community groups (Carr and Halvorsen
2001; Thomas 1995). Recently, e-government initiatives, which allow citizens to voice their opinions and
needs through Web sites and Listservs, have become a
relatively low-cost way to facilitate more transparent
and accessible decision-making processes (Thomas and
Streib 2003; Welch, Hinnant, and Moon 2005).
These citizen participation tools typically support
what Roberts (2002) calls “direction-based” accountability, in which administrative goals are aligned with
political and constituent goals. Another form of
accountability in public organizations is performancebased accountability (Roberts 2002). Performancebased accountability typically requires systems or tools
for identifying measures of organizational inputs,
outputs, and outcomes and for collecting performance
data and then comparing those data against agency
goals or standards. Public managers can then use
performance information to help refine internal goals
and strategies (i.e., “managing for results”), as well as
to garner external support for the agency by sharing
performance information with citizens, oversight
agencies, and legislators (Moynihan 2005). One of the
difficulties of developing performance management
systems is that public agency goals are frequently
based on legislative and legal mandates that are vague
and ill defined. These mandates influence both the
indicators that agencies select to measure performance
and the criteria used to assess those indicators.
Given these costs and benefits, public administrators
and public administration scholars have begun to
seriously examine the conditions that support the
effective use of public participation (King, Feltey, and
Susel 1998; Renn et al. 1993; Thomas 1995). In
general, no one best method exists for integrating
Performance-based accountability, therefore, is linked
citizen input into policy and management decisions.
A wide variety of tools and forums exist for citizens to to direction-based accountability and requires citizen
participation because citizen expectations play a critical
participate in decision-making processes, and the
role in shaping how an agency
advantage of a particular tool, or
defines its mission and defining
suite of tools, often depends on
... another mechanism that has the criteria for “success” that will
the purposes of the agency
been found to be effective in
be used in meeting those goals.
decision, its mission, and its legal
program planning and assessNot surprisingly, then, some
mandates (Thomas 1995).
scholars have recognized that
Historically, open public meetment is the use of citizen
ings and hearings have been the
advisory committees or special performance management repredominant statutorily required
task forces to identify commu- form efforts are not likely to
succeed in achieving government
methods for ensuring citizen
nity needs and interests and to accountability apart from active
input. However, another
solicit recommendations to
citizen dialogue and exchange in
mechanism that has been found
meet those needs.
public decision making (Harmon
to be effective in program plan1995; Roberts 2002). Successful
ning and assessment is the use of
implementation of performance management systems
citizen advisory committees or special task forces to
has been associated with external support, not only
identify community needs and interests and to solicit
from top management and elected officials but from
recommendations to meet those needs. Citizen surcitizens as well (Berman and Wang 2000).3
veys are also commonly used to assess opinions about
Citizen Involvement and Performance Management in Special-Purpose Governments 239
On a practical level, the movement to incorporate
citizen participation into performance management
decisions is relatively new. At this time, only a handful
of efforts to use citizens in the design of performance
management systems have been started across local
governments throughout the United States (NCPP
2005). The National Center for Public Productivity’s
Citizen-Driven Government Performance Initiative,
for example, tracks a number of these cases and makes
recommendations to municipal governments on how
to engage citizens in performance management decisions. These cases include a project to encourage
citizen-initiated performance measures in Iowa.
Researchers following this initiative found that
citizens are able to identify performance measures that
local governments often ignore, such as the quality of
customer service, thus enhancing the legitimacy of
performance measurement (Ho and Coates 2002).
Furthermore, a study by the Urban Institute that
examined performance management and citizen
involvement by local agencies in five states found that
“[c]itizen participation elevates performance management from a system promoting greater efficiency in
operations and resource allocations to a system for
more responsive government” (Dusenbury, Liner, and
Vinson 2002, 4).
One area of local government in which citizen participation and performance management efforts have
not been assessed is special-purpose governments.
Given that the number of special-district governments
in the United States has almost tripled over the past
50 years to an estimated 35,052 districts (U.S. Census
Bureau 2002), it is important to examine accountability mechanisms such as citizen participation and
performance management at this level. Another key
reason to evaluate citizen participation and performance management among special districts is to
evaluate the charge that these governmental units are
less accountable to citizens. Because of the specialized
nature of the services they provide, districts are often
less visible than general-purpose governments, and
citizens may know relatively little about their political
and management processes, potentially leading to
unchecked service financing (Axelrod 1992; Bollens
1957; Mitchell 1992). As Kathryn Foster (1997, 4)
notes, “[d]istricts enjoy the financial reach, tax-exempt
status, and quasi-monopolistic service delivery advantages of public governments, together with the political isolation, management flexibility, and financial
discretion of private corporations.”
Understanding the extent to which districts engage in
or rely on citizens to identify performance indicators
and communicate with citizens about performance
will help us to weigh in on the argument that districts
are not accountable to citizens. In addition, focusing
on this type of government provides evidence to determine the extent to which the trend toward citizen240
Public Administration Review • March | April 2007
driven performance measures has spread to this area of
local government. If special districts are commonly set
up to be less accountable or are shielded from public
input, we would expect the external incentives or
pressures from principals to adopt performance management systems and to include citizens in organizational functions to be largely absent.
Methodology
To investigate and compare how special districts relate
citizen interests to performance goals and indicators,
we used a small-n comparative study design with
multiple methods of data collection. First, we
addressed the districts’ own perspectives through
interviews with managers (directors, general managers,
or chief executives) of nine special-purpose governments in the state of Texas. Second, we analyzed
minutes from governing board meetings of those same
districts. Third, we assessed the perspectives of
residents served by the districts through focus groups
to investigate citizens’ knowledge of special-district
performance, as well as their familiarity with
public-input processes in districts.
We chose to conduct this analysis in Texas because
districts in that state vary substantially by type, size,
age, and location, thus offering a valuable setting for
comparative analysis. Additionally, Texas is one of the
states with the highest number of districts overall,
according to the U.S. Census of Governments (U.S.
Census Bureau 2002). In fact, among the 50 states,
Texas ranks highest in the number of special districts
authorized by city or county governments, with 1,089
districts in 2002 (U.S. Census Bureau 2002), and
third among the states in all special districts (authorized by state and local governments), with 2,245.
The U.S. Census Bureau (2002) identifies 24 different
categories of districts. Research has suggested—and
we suspect—that categorical differences and servicedelivery foci among the different types of districts may
influence the performance and operations of districts
(Foster 1997; Stephens and Wikstrom 1998). With
this in mind, we created our sampling frame intending a most-same/most-different methodology.
Our sampling frame was constructed from the
Government Organization Directory in the 2002 U.S.
Census of Governments. We limited our geographic
scope to the population of districts in three metropolitan areas in Texas: Austin/Travis County, Houston/
Harris County, and San Antonio/Bexar County. This
sampling frame allowed for comparisons of districts
and citizen perceptions of districts within and across
municipal regions. We also limited our sampling
frame to districts in three diverse areas of public
service: water-related districts, health-related districts,
and housing- and community development–related
districts. These district types were selected because of
their prominence among district types and because
they matched the investigators’ substantive expertise.
Our final sample of districts in Texas included nine
organizations. We initially used purposive sampling to
identify 14 districts from the three metropolitan areas,
choosing cases to ensure that the sample included a
range of district sizes and ages. However, after
contacting districts by mail and telephone to request
participation in our study, five districts either did not
respond or chose not to participate, resulting in the
final sample of nine districts. Table 1 provides a
breakdown of the districts, their functions, and their
metropolitan areas.
The first phase of our research involved semistructured
in-person interviews with district managers. The
interviews focused on both knowledge and use of
performance management systems, as well as the role
of citizens in organizational processes. We also queried
managers about the role of citizen involvement in
districts more broadly, the importance of citizen involvement, and their use of public input in management
decisions. After the interviews, a transcription of the
audiotapes was entered into a data management and
analysis software system, QSR’s NVivo. We then coded
the interviews to compare performance management
practices and the use of and opinions about citizen
involvement in district performance across interviews.
After the interviews, governing board meeting minutes were collected from each district interviewed. The
minutes were analyzed to assess how often and in
what context performance indicators were discussed
by the governing body and to examine discussions
(if any) of the use of citizen input to identify performance goals, to measure performance, and to use or
respond to performance reports and citizen feedback.
The minutes collected covered two years of board
meetings from June 2002 to May 2004. This time
frame was selected to capture cyclical discussions of
performance measurement and reporting. Unfortunately, one of the districts (A1) refused our request for
copies of their board minutes; thus, our sample for
document analysis contained only eight districts
instead of nine.4 The documents were coded in the
same way as the interview data. Once again, QSR’s
NVivo was used for the analysis.
The third source of data for our study came from
focus groups that we convened in each of the three
metropolitan areas where the sample districts operate.
We used the focus groups to gather a general picture
of the knowledge that citizens who were active in local
government (but not necessarily active with districts)
had about the existence, operations, and performance
of special districts in their community. We sought out
citizens active in local government because we felt
they would be “in the know” and thus more likely to
have knowledge of or interest in district operations
than the average citizen. Although active citizens are
not a representative sample of communities, we based
our sample on the assumption that these individuals
would be a good litmus test for the knowledge of less
involved individuals.
Focus group participants were initially identified by
contacting city council members and city managers in
the three metropolitan regions and asking for the
names and contact information of nonelected citizens
who were active in local government. We also relied
on professional contacts involved in state government
to provide the names of several citizen activists who
were knowledgeable in the area of local government.
In contacting the initial list of citizens, we asked them
to nominate other individuals who were active in local
government and might be interested in participating
in the focus groups. We invited between 16 and 20
people in each municipal region to participate in the
focus groups. Eight people attended the focus group
in Houston, seven in San Antonio, and nine in
Austin. Each session lasted approximately 90 minutes
and was conducted by the principal investigators.
Findings: Searching for Connections
between Citizens and Performance
Evidence from Manager Interviews
In looking at how districts involve citizens in performance management decisions, it is clear that most of
the districts in our study do not directly involve citizens in either the design or reporting of performance
information. (See table 2 for a summary of the methods districts use to engage citizens reported by managers.) When asked about the extent to which citizens
are involved in district decision making and performance management, most of the district managers
Table 1 Overview of Districts Included in the Pilot Study
Metropolitan Area
A
B
C
District Code
Type/Mission
A1
A2
A3
B1
B2
C1
C2
C3
C4
Housing: Provide low-income housing
Water: Supply water, wastewater treatment, and water reuse
Water: Provide low-cost utility services and ensure the protection of the area’s natural resources
Health: Provide acute and emergency care for the indigent population
Housing: Provide affordable housing and promoting economic self-sufficiency
Water: Preserve, protect, and manage the river and its tributaries
Health: Promote health and prevent disease
Housing: Build and maintain affordable housing
Water: Preserve and protect aquifer
Citizen Involvement and Performance Management in Special-Purpose Governments 241
were not able to identify explicit procedures or
formalized processes whereby citizens contribute to
the establishment of performance criteria or the
reviewing of performance measures.
However, at least one district manager (B1) cited
concrete ways in which advisory boards play a role in
the performance measurement processes of the organization. Not coincidentally, this is the same district
that gives its citizen advisory board some actual decision making authority (discussed later). In explaining
how this district uses its advisory board to assess
organizational performance, the district manager
stated, “They also tell us where you are doing a great
job or not so good a job.” Despite this effort to
include citizens in performance monitoring, the organization has a weak performance management system.
Furthermore, the district uses the performance measures that citizens help to design only to a very limited
extent by incorporating them into the strategicplanning process. Another district (A3) also integrates
citizen input into its strategic-planning and goalsetting processes, which the district claimed to use as
criteria to help develop performance measures. The
district, however, did not identify specific indicators
of performance that citizens had directly developed.
The limited use of citizen involvement in performance
management by our sample districts is not at all
surprising, given that we found relatively weak
performance management systems in place in many of
the districts (see Isett and Heikkila, under review). In
fact, of all the nine districts we studied, only two of
the districts (A3 and C2) had any recognizable
Table 2 Use of Citizens in District Decision Making (Reported by District Managers)
District Type
Health
Housing
Water
242
Code
Input on Performance
Indicators
Reporting of
Performance
Advisory Boards
Other Tools
B1
Some input on indicator
development and
usefulness
Monthly reports to
governing board
11 community boards
plus one overarching
community advisory board
“Management by walking
around”; attending
local community
meetings
C2
No direct citizen input
Annually to the public,
periodically to elected
officials
One general advisory board
and other supplemental
board with ties to specific
issues and initiatives
City council feedback;
media
A1
No direct citizen input
Board annual progress
report
One board with general
advisory duties
Required resident survey;
informal resident
feedback
Several boards
B2
No direct citizen input
Board
C3
No direct citizen input
Several boards, one at each
Internally, occasionally
housing development
at executive meetings;
externally to federal
regulators
A2
No direct citizen input,
but committees
under board may
request performance
metrics
Some reporting through
newsletter and
community meetings
Three committees under
district board:
administrative and
community relations,
finance/audit, and
engineering and
operations
Weekly meeting with
community leaders’
club
A3
No direct citizen input,
but some input on
strategic planning
Quarterly updates to
customers
Several committees from
local irrigation districts
(customers); light and river
advisory panels
Professional poll of 1,200
customers and citizens
every two to three
years; integrated
resource planning
process; open house
C1
No direct citizen input
Quarterly newsletter
to city, county, other
government agencies
and public mailing list
Several, including flood
control panel; watershed
improvement advisory
committee; river
improvement committee
Scanning community
needs through county
and city jurisdictions
C4
No direct citizen input
Monthly general
manager’s report to
interested parties and
officials; external
water advisory
committee submits
report to legislature
Several, including technical
advisory group, water
quality task force
Public meetings for
proposed decisions
Public Administration Review • March | April 2007
Required resident survey
Required resident survey
performance management systems in place at the time Though all of the district managers acknowledged the
of our interviews, although all had some sort of
value of citizen input in decision making, managers
performance measurement process. So, in the end, it
also exhibited some skepticism about the abilities and
is difficult to discern whether the
skills of the citizens serving on
lack of contribution to perfortheir advisory boards, particuThe limited use of citizen
mance management by citizens is a
larly their ability to make ininvolvement in performance
function of the lack of perforformed decisions about
management by our sample
mance management or the lack of
management issues. Typical
interest in citizen input.
districts is not at all surprising, comments about citizen input
included, “They ask for things
given that we found relatively
Despite the deficiency of citizen
weak performance management that are not practical,” “I think
involvement in performance manon the education part and
systems in place in many of
agement, the districts in this
understanding of what we do
the districts.
sample incorporate citizen input in
and what we are capable of
other ways that at least indirectly
doing, the learning curve is
influence their assessments of performance. As table 2
way down there,” and “Some of the things they ask
summarizes, many use communication tools such as
you for, you would not put in any plan.” Part of this
newsletters and quarterly updates to inform citizens of skepticism seems to stem from the fact that district
what they are doing, but these are one-way processes.
managers reported having difficulty finding interested
Occasionally, some districts seek citizen input through and willing participants to serve on their boards. A
public meetings, particularly when major funding
few districts mentioned that they believed their citizen
issues are on the table. One district
advisory boards could be more
manager (A2) mentioned working
useful and effective if they
Though all of the district
informally with community
could recruit interested and
managers acknowledged the
groups to gauge citizen opinions
motivated individuals, but in
value of citizen input in decision the end, as one manager stated,
by attending a weekly “Men’s
Breakfast Club” for city leaders.
making, managers also exhibited “They do not want to be
Another district (A3) also reported
involved.” To address this probsome skepticism about the
using citizen surveys to gather
abilities and skills of the citizens lem, one of the district managinput from the public.
ers noted that he had initiated a
serving on their advisory boards, “stakeholder identification”
particularly their ability to make process, focusing on expanding
The most common way that disinformed decisions about
tricts reported engaging with
the list of relevant stakeholders
citizens is through the use of advibeyond those who traditionally
management issues.
sory boards or committees. Most
participate in citizen advisory
of the advisory boards in our samcommittees.
ple of districts have no formal policy-making or binding input into agency matters. Rather, the advisory
Alternatively, the manager of the district whose adviboards are used to solicit ideas about particular
sory board holds some discretionary authority had a
projects or to maintain two-way ties to the commumore positive view of participant recruitment
nity more generally. As one manager stated, “It is a
(perhaps not unrelated to the real authority of the
great mechanism for us to go out and educate people
group). This manager stated,
on what we are doing . . . and to get [the public] to
It is a self-sustaining advisory board. We don’t
tell us what they need in the community.” Though
appoint them. Initially, the first board was
most boards are purely advisory, in at least one case
appointed; they served for x number of years
(B1), a citizen advisory panel has decision-making
power and can actually veto board decisions on
and the terms were staggered. Whenever the
person on the board gets reappointed . . . or any
matters of direct concern to clients. One of the water
new members come in, there is a vote taken and
districts (A2) has three committees consisting of
approximately 20 citizen volunteers that make recompeople apply for board seats . . . [it is] pretty
mendations to the board of directors on specific manmuch self-sustaining. They reappoint themselves or other members of the community.
agement decisions, including engineering and
There are no vacancies. I can tell you, when it
operations, finance, and administration. Overall, the
comes down to voting on people, it sometimes
extent to which the districts rely on citizens as organizational resources varies (none of that variance could
gets political. . . . And I say, “look you work
be attributed to district type or location), yet all
with your board, we do not appoint the board
districts reported using an advisory format—at least
members.” But we have very few vacancies, the
nominally—to include citizens in organizational
meetings are very well attended, and we take it
governance.
very seriously.
Citizen Involvement and Performance Management in Special-Purpose Governments 243
Evidence from District Governing Boards
According to the governing board meeting minutes
reviewed for our study, the governing boards of the
sample districts are largely interested in financial
outcomes and service-quality performance indicators.
Agenda items that were common across all boards in
each of the monthly meeting minutes were financial
audits and the evaluation of specific projects, and
sometimes the assessment of needs for future projects,
programs, and resources. The interests and needs of
citizens as they relate to performance were not commonly discussed during the two-year time frame,
although meetings occasionally included citizen input
on certain programmatic issues.
Of the eight districts that provided minutes to us,
four made no mention of citizen participation in the
two years of minutes we reviewed. District C4 discussed the findings from a citizen advisory committee
in one of its monthly meetings over the two years,
though this was not related to performance but to
program planning. Similarly, district C3’s board discussed citizen input on program or project planning
at three separate meetings. District A3 discussed citizen input and management decisions in a number of
meetings, such as opportunities for staff to gather and
use input from customers on proposed rate increases
and on long-term planning for water provision. Only
two of the boards (C2 and C3) discussed citizen
participation in performance management directly,
but each at only two of the meetings over 24 months.
Notably, district C3 had an ad hoc committee that
focused on public input as a form of performance
measurement.
Evidence from the Focus Groups
knowledge of and participation in districts was quite
limited, despite the fact that all of the focus group
members were active in local neighborhood associations and other civic groups and frequently participated in municipal governance activities. Even more
notable was the fact that the focus group members in
region B generally did not separate the role of special
districts from municipal and county government. As
one participant said, “Special districts normally have
to go to the county or the city in order to get things
done.” During this focus group session, some members were able to identify a particular hospital district
or a housing authority, but focus group members
frequently directed their frustration with government
in general toward the city. Notably, it was only in this
region that the districts did not mention citizens at
all in their governing board minutes. Thus, there
seemed to be a lack of connection between citizens
and districts in region B.
Participants in region C were more familiar with and
had more direct involvement with districts—one
member had served on a housing district task force,
another had served on a water district task force, and a
third had spent time working on lobbying efforts
affecting a local health district. We saw a fairly
positive trend in this region regarding the relationship
between citizens and districts. Not only had some of
our focus group members participated in district
advisory boards, but our document analysis revealed
that the districts in this region at least discussed
citizen input at their governing board meetings
(although the actual influence these discussions had
on decisions is unclear).
Even more than in region C, the focus group memThe focus group sessions that we conducted confirmed bers in region A were all quite familiar with special
the findings from our manager interviews and
districts, a few of them having worked directly with
analysis of board meeting minutes: Districts do
districts as employees or employees of organizations
not appear to seek input from citizens on performance that interacted with the districts. The types of districts
criteria and are not very effective at reporting on persome members had interacted with included a housing
formance to citizens. As with our other sources of data, authority, a transportation authority, and various water
the focus groups indicate that citizens typically partici- districts. What was most telling about the different
pate in district decision making only through advisory
degrees of knowledge among the focus groups was the
boards. Moreover, only a few of the focus group parextent to which the participants in region A underticipants had actually participated
stood the organization and
on district advisory boards. Overstructure of special districts. For
... participants commented on example, participants comall, we did not find any marked
some of the accountability
differences in the extent to which
mented on some of the accountproblems of districts being tied ability problems of districts
citizens had participated in districts, or their knowledge of disbeing tied to the legislative
to the legislative processes of
trict operations, by district type or
setting up districts, the funding processes of setting up districts,
function.
sources of districts, and the dif- the funding sources of districts,
and the different ways in which
ferent ways in which district
We did, however, notice differdistrict board members were
board members were chosen.
ences across the three communichosen.
ties in terms of how much
citizens know about special districts and the extent to The focus group sessions also indicated that public
which they participate in districts. In region B,
participation was seen as both valuable and important
244
Public Administration Review • March | April 2007
to these citizens, but they did not feel the opportunities for participating in districts were widely available.
One participant in region B who was interested in
public housing issues noted that “there hasn’t been any
citizen participation or involvement in the decisionmaking process” for planning public housing. A
participant in region C noted that citizens “have to
badger special districts to do some things” and that
“they often do not inform neighborhood associations
about issues pertinent to them.” Similarly, a participant in region A felt that “many districts have been set
up to put layers in . . . and try to get around citizen
participation.” Notably, none of the participants
recalled working on issues to assess the performance of
districts, making recommendations about performance indicators, or even having received information
about district performance.
In general, most of the citizen activists in our sample
had a certain cynicism toward government’s use of
their volunteer time. Across the three sites, a
consistent theme was that although these citizens
participated in order to have an impact in their
communities, more often than not, they felt there was
a tokenism to having citizen input. Citizen input was
described as “box-checking” or a “formality.”
Thus, the overall mood of the three focus groups
suggests that citizens generally are not viewed as part
of the accountability equation in district governance.
Part of this frustration may be a result of their lack of
knowledge about districts. Another source of participants’ frustrations may stem from the fact that they
often see the results of their experiences participating
with other forms of local government as unsatisfactory, feeling that decision makers often do not
listen to their concerns when they do participate.
Because our sample of participants was not a representative sample of the population, we cannot generalize
these findings, but given that these citizens were
chosen because they were “in the know” with local
government, they certainly suggest there are differences across these regions in the extent to which local
governments are open to citizen input. Though this
could be attributable to some selection biases among
the participants, it could also indicate that the larger
governance setting of a community plays a vital role
in spawning knowledge of special district operations
and performance.
Recommendations
In addition to providing feedback on citizen knowledge of district operations and performance, the focus
groups elicited ideas about improving citizen participation and communication about performance. First,
public participation needs to be taken more seriously
by districts, and more opportunities need to be
opened for two-way communication between districts
and citizens. In terms of opportunities for participation, a consistent recommendation across all focus
groups was that citizen advisory committees could be
used more effectively by choosing participants who are
more representative of the community and then using
the advice from these groups more consistently in
decision making. As one of the focus group members
pointed out from her experience with a water district,
the district “had citizen boards, [but] would make
decisions prior to citizen input being presented.”
In thinking about these recommendations, one
caveat—which ties into the responses gained from the
manager interviews—is that a number of the citizens
we spoke with did not want to spend an inordinate
amount of time participating in decision making.
Given that the citizens we met with tended to be quite
active in local government and were typically stretched
thin on their community commitments, this is not
surprising.5 In light of this sentiment, some of the
other suggestions for improving citizen participation
included using surveys and actively soliciting information from neighborhood groups to gather input on
proposed decisions or goals and widening the search
for willing participants instead of relying on a limited
number of known individuals. Some participants
commented that they simply wanted more information
from the districts, particularly better financial reporting and more direct information on district operations. Using the media and press releases to inform
citizens about district operations and to explain how
they are meeting their goals was also a suggestion that
a number of participants raised. According to one
participant, “media is essential. . . . People get newsletters from an organization and these are likely to just
get tossed.”
Obviously, engaging citizens in the management
decisions of public organizations is a complex issue;
the array of management decisions and policy choices
can require a variety of types of citizen input and
involvement. The focus of this study is not to explain
this array of options—rather, it is to give insights into
ways citizens can be more engaged in performance
management decisions and reporting. Thus, to direct
our recommendations from the focus groups to this
issue, we have categorized some of the ideas from the
focus groups according to ways to (1) garner citizen
input on performance criteria, (2) improve performance management processes to allow more citizen
involvement, and (3) communicate performance
information with citizens more effectively (see table 3).
To demonstrate the appropriateness of these recommendations for performance management, we have
contextualized them by placing them against standards for performance management offered by the
Governmental Accounting and Standards Board
(GASB). These standards come from the GASB’s
2003 special report on “Reporting Performance
Citizen Involvement and Performance Management in Special-Purpose Governments 245
Information: Suggested Criteria for Effective Communication.” The GASB’s standards are clearly linked to
the ideas produced in the focus groups.
local governments has shown, these recommendations
are indeed feasible.
Of course, the feasibility of incorporating citizen
Discussion and Conclusions
input into performance decisions assumes that citizens
The findings from this study offer valuable insights for are willing to participate in districts and pay attention
the growing body of literature linking citizen particito district decisions. Some district managers noted
pation to performance management among public
that people simply do not attend their meetings, and
agencies by examining a level of government that has
our focus group participants acknowledged that many
not previously been addressed. This research also
people simply do not want to engage in government
contributes to the broad body of literature on special
decisions or do not have the time. One of our unantidistricts, particularly theories concerned with account- cipated findings was the difference we found across
ability in special-district governments. In some
the three regions (rather than across district type) in
respects, our findings are consistent with the literaour focus group participants’ knowledge of and expeture, which suggests districts are largely hidden from
rience with special districts. Focus group participants
public scrutiny, though not necessarily to the extent
in region B were much less informed about districts
that critics of special districts argue. Special-district
than those in regions A and C, whereas the focus
governments, like many other levels of government,
group in region A exhibited in-depth knowledge of
engage citizens in decision making to some degree
the districts in that region. We suspect this may have
through the use of citizen advisory boards, public
something to do with the degree of openness and
meetings, and informal mechanisms such as networktransparency within the larger governance setting in
ing with community organizathese communities, which could
tions. This finding
nurture mutual trust between
Even when citizens actively
was consistent across the three
citizens and government and
participate with districts, it is
types of districts and three rethus greater willingness to
important to keep in mind that participate.
gions we evaluated. The limited
use of citizens to establish perforthe citizens who tend to get
mance management criteria and
involved may not necessarily be Even when citizens actively
the weaknesses of these agencies
representative of their broader participate with districts, it is
in reporting, however, indicates
important to keep in mind that
communities.
that districts certainly have room
the citizens who tend to get
for improvement in achieving
involved may not necessarily be
accountability. Many of the ideas for improvement
representative of their broader communities. Research
gleaned from our focus groups are clearly linked to the on public participation and other voluntary efforts
professional standards being put forth at other levels
suggests that people from dominant status groups
of government. Moreover, as recent research on other
(e.g., well-educated, middle- to upper-income
Table 3 Recommendations for Citizen Roles in Performance Management in Special Districts
Theme
Garnering public input
Performance management
process ideas
Performance measurement
reporting
246
Focus Group Responses
Ensure citizen input is representative of the
community
Engage in education and public awareness
about district functions
Use surveys more often
Involve citizens in planning processes
GASB Standards
Use a variety of forums for gauging input
Include citizens, elected officials, and employees in
establishing the goals of organization
Develop more transparent planning
processes
Ensure managers look at the indicators and
respond to them
Conduct third-party audits
Develop a strategic plan with mission, goals, and
objectives clearly stated
Inform neighborhood associations about
issues pertinent to them
Issue press releases and work more closely
with the media
Report budget and financial data more
often and more directly with citizens
Report on what the districts are actually
doing
Make information easy to access and report at
multiple levels
Performance information should be reported
through a variety of mediums
Performance information should include data on
resources and costs of programs and outputs
Measures should be relevant; focus on major or
critical programs and services and major goals
and objectives
Public Administration Review • March | April 2007
Information should be reliable and citizens
should be able to assess the reliability of sources
citizens) are more likely to get involved in public
forums (Claiborn and Martin 2000), leaving disadvantaged groups underrepresented in public participation forums (Roberts 2004). Thus, the likelihood of
truly representative “participation” may be a misnomer for forums such as advisory committees and
public meetings.
However “nonrepresentative” these forums may be,
those who participate are also likely to participate in
other civic activities. So although they are overburdened, they also have the capacity to share information outside the immediate circle of participants,
networking with other groups and potentially spreading knowledge and information informally. Building
institutions that can empower these citizens and
others is what Denhardt and Denhardt (2000) argue
is essential to effective governance.
We fully acknowledge that the findings of this small-n
study are limited in their generalizability. Yet we
believe that our multiple sources of data, our attention
to multiple types of districts, and our analysis of multiple locations furnishes a measure of empirical rigor.
The next step in this research would be to perform a
larger-n analysis to see whether these findings hold in
other settings and across multiple districts. In the
meantime, we recommend that district managers and
policy makers begin to think about ways that districts
can use the lessons drawn from our focus groups, as
well as the insights of the government accountability
movement that is spreading across other local
governments.
obvious in the government reform movement.
As Schachter (1995) argues, the reinvention
movement and the New Public Management
paradigm of the mid-1990s largely viewed citizens
as “customers” to be served rather than “owners”
who are active and engaged in public agencies.
These movements arguably espoused performance
management, but not the active participation of
citizens in making performance management
decisions.
4. The organization that did not participate in our
document review was contacted several times by
mail (three times) and by telephone (six times) to
obtain the documents over a period of three
months. Unfortunately, although this organization
had agreed to supply the documents, we never
received them. After reviewing the documents
from the other two organizations in this class
(housing), we suspected that the added value of
the missing documents would be fairly low, as
these organizations were heavily focused on
compliance with federal government regulations
and did little in the way of performance management or citizen input beyond what was required of
them by federal regulations. This conclusion was
confirmed by the content of the interviews.
5. On a positive note, all of the citizens we met with
reported a strong sense of satisfaction from their
participation in local government. Even if the
process itself was sometimes frustrating for them,
most felt they were doing something useful for
their neighborhoods.
References
Acknowledgments
We would like to thank the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation’s Program on Performance Assessment of Municipal Governments for its support of this research. We
would also like to acknowledge the contributions of
Deborah Kerr throughout this project. This project
benefited greatly from the help of all of our research
assistants: Ilona Pesti, Shanette Lewis, Leslie Barron,
Leila Azari, Noopur Batsha, and Amy Osorio.
Notes
1. We acknowledge that special districts and public
authorities are not the same. However, the U.S.
Census of Governments counts both types of
entities in the same category. Thus, we use the
term districts to be consistent with the information
contained in the Census of Governments.
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